I wasn’t sure what to expect from my first Future Leaders talk. Having only become a member of The Marketing Society earlier this year, I was still buzzing from my first event – Digital Day 2025 – the previous week and feeling inspired. Arriving at Carat’s office, in a beautiful building in the heart of Edinburgh, there was already a hum of socialising from my fellow Future Leaders. The warm and welcoming atmosphere from Digital Day carried over and I was lucky enough to chat with some of the other attendees later over a vino and a slice of pizza, what more could you ask for?
First though, we were officially welcomed by our host for the evening, Michael Goldberg, Vice-Chair of the Future Leaders Advisory Group (FLAG), who set the scene. Michael then introduced Chris Marsh, MD at Carat, Fellow of The Marketing Society and our much-anticipated guest speaker.
Chris started by giving us a whistle stop tour of his career. With a passion for brands that’s taken him from beverages to banks and now to the agency side, Chris joked that he uses the term ‘career’ loosely since none of it was really planned. Maybe it’s true that sometimes the best plan is no plan at all.
With an encouraging quote from Winnie C, ‘Success consists of failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.’, Chris dove into his ‘Top 5 f*ck ups’. Each f*ck up gave us plenty to think about. From the pressures of overworking to prove yourself and losing perspective to being too ultra-focused and resistant to change, Chris laid it all on the table. His candid and refreshing take on how careers often unfold, was appreciated by all of us listeners.
My personal favourite was f*ck up no.4 titled ‘WTAF’. Chris opened up about a self-proclaimed ‘steaming pile of sh*t’ advert he’d created for the bank. Especially after having previously launched an ad he was passionate about, having to do the same for one he didn’t believe in must’ve been nothing short of frustrating. Ironically, the ad that Chris was proud of had little impact while the ‘steaming pile of sh*t’ was a roaring success. Lesson being, you can never accurately predict what will resonate with customers and sometimes you need to set your personal preferences to the side.
We wrapped up with an informal Q&A where Chris got to elaborate on his journey from client to agency and tackled some hard-hitting questions on whether AI will steal our jobs and if the agency industry is ageist. Reflecting on his answers, Chris described them as ‘some f**king deep sh*t’ and I think we all agreed with that sentiment.
Chris’ talk drove home that sometimes sh*t happens and what might seem like a career ending escapade at the time, often seems much smaller in hindsight. Some other key takeaways on navigating failure and coping with stress were to talk to people, keep fit and healthy and to not lose sight of what’s important. Chris has had an incredibly successful career and we all thoroughly enjoyed hearing about his journey. His humorous and authentic approach made it all he more memorable.
Future Leaders #2 set the bar for my time in the programme, and I can’t wait for more!
By Robyn Fowler, Member Communications Consultant at The Exeter and a Future Leader Member of The Marketing Society
